Election - what on earth? Explain to me please!

[HollyMollyDolly]

Ok this is quite embarrassing!

I've recently joined the Civil Service at the grand age of 35 and there's been a lot of talk about the election. So far, I've managed to excuse myself from the conversations because I have 0 idea what is happening.

I struggle a bit with anxiety so tend to avoid the news and I've never understood politics but now it seems I need to.

Can someone please explain to me, in stupid person terms, what's actually going on and why Rishi Sunaks latest announcement is a big deal?

Also to be noted that @RaspberryRipple2 and others are totally right in terms of proper parliamentary procedure, but the (probable) reason that it’s been called this early is that there was going to be a vote of no confidence, so Rishi had his hand forced. It’s also worth looking at Simon Case’s evidence this week, he’s been on sick leave for months and has only just shown up this week, almost years later, to give his evidence to the Covid inquiry - def worth a look if you’re wondering why an election has been called months before it needs to be

My holiday was booked some time ago. I will be out of the country. I have applied for a postal vote, but its incredibly naive to think that this won't affect turnout in Scotland

A postal vote would be my solution; it's not difficult. In fact, unless I take action before ballots are issued that's what I'll do.

The complaint from Swinney et al is about discourtesy. I suspect nobody in either No10 or Whitehall even considered it. Which is why it's discourteous.

I was working in the Civil Service at the time of Cameron's 'bonfire of the quangos' and working in a cross border body slated for abolition. Nobody in Whitehall had actually considered the practicalities or how such a decision would play out in Edinburgh.

@Imicola exactly!!!

Unless the Scots decide to do a big fuck you to the Tories and make it the best attended election ever. 😆😆

That could be cool.

Schools holidays here in NI too - not that anyone (inc the Scots) seem to care about that

I think this is the case. There was a very hyped up conversation happening in the canteen and I just felt a bit rabbit in the headlights.

Admittedly, the grades in the canteen are rather varied and the person leading the conversation felt their personal role is going to be impacted quite significantly.

I think as a civil servant you probably have to be careful what you say on mumsnet now

Unfortunately I don't feel I have a connection with anyone yet whereby I could ask the question, I'm very new to the role and still very much on small talk but nothing more basis with everyone.

Well if it affects turnout, maybe, just maybe Scotland will get the government they deserve ?

Sorry but if your excuse for not voting is "it's too much hassle" when the hassle is simply applying for a postal vote, not walking on your hands over the Alps whiles whistling Dixie, then maybe you need to watch reports where people have to walk for weeks to vote in more far flung places of the world. It's an even more pathetic excuse than "there's no one to vote for."

Thank you, I have been conscious of this and held back on sharing my background, role, personal views etc. The same with social media.

OP - listen to The Rest Is Politics Podcast. There’s a new episode about the election. It’ll take you 45 minutes and will explain a lot.

I never worried too much about pseudonymous forums but the ones I was on then had a much smaller reach than Mumsnet.

Posting in your own name on SM is another question. Very risky. My partner got caught posting something rude about the University who sponsored her by then sinking PhD.

She got a very strongly worded warning.

It's definitely worth being aware of. My SM is very much based around my pets and the odd travel picture - I'm not one for sharing views or anything controversial on there.

I do appreciate the advice, thank you!

The civil service is huge and covers loads of different roles in many different sectors and at all kinds of levels.

For many people who work in the civil service a general election and a change of government will have very little impact on their day to day life.

Me and my husband are both civil servants, it's big news for him in his role, it means nothing to me in mine.

Until I was working in a Quango chaired by a retired Cabinet Minister politics only impinged on my role when Minsters decided to re-jig the service I was responsible for delivering.

So 25 years out of 35 who was in power had next to no bearing on what I did.

I haven't made any negative digs. You made a cryptic comment about the reason you don't have basic info on this.

I understand why it is surprising to people that a 35 year old who has chosen (presumably) to work in the civil service doesn't already know some basics or have the nous to find out. (A 2 second look at the BBC News website returned this link which you may find useful
www.bbc.co.uk/news

It's even called "a simple guide"

I grew up in a household where BBC TV news was Dad's required viewing every night and The Guardian delivered every day. I absorbed this stuff before I'd left Primary School. 1970 was the first GE when I was sufficiently interested to follow the activities of Messrs Wilson and Heath.

Starting work in 1978 aged 18 I was surprised how uninformed and disengaged some of my colleagues were.

Much later, 2017, one of the team I was in didn't seem to understand how elections, constituencies and first past the post played out on the night.

Anyway Op, if after reading about the basics you still don't feel confident having a full on conversation about the election with your colleagues just nod and look thoughtful and say non-committal things like

Interesting times ahead

Oh, I never discuss who I'm going to vote for

You never really know how these things will turn out do you?

You're probably right

It's hard to disagree

Etc etc

Worth looking up who your MP is and what their voting record is like. Theyworkforyou is a good website for that.

@Bromptotoo

To be fair the Tories gave no consideration as to the impact abolishing quangos would have anywhere.
At the time I was working in QCDA, Gove couldn't wait to get his hands on us and was raging when he realised he couldn't just wave his hand and get rid of us. He failed to understand that we were a statutory body and legislation was needed to abolish us - which took 2 years. And the result? Most of the functions went into the DfE, which was stuffed with policy people. The DfE increased massively in size, the Dept was left with buildings with long leases, redundancy bills etc etc.
Gove also abolished non statutory, but very useful, bodies such as BECTA

Long story short OP in a general election people vote for who they want to make policies (laws) in the government. For a while many people have been voting Conservative because the papers told them to and they think they're middle class because they earn over 29k when in reality to be middle class these days you need upwards of 50k per earner in a household (outside of London). They've been shafted like fuck and the government have been exposed as shameless liars especially during the pandemic, and only just now are most people starting to change their tune.

Exactly, civil servants covers a multitude of roles, people may want to educate themselves on that before gunning for her. Op, I think the feedback that you need to be more specific is fair though.

Your department will probably have some training available that will help you understand all this.

In the meantime cover up by just asking questions about what the pre-election period means for you and your team - nobody would expect a newbie to know that.

On the plus side it sounds like impartiality might not be an issue for you

How did you get into a CS post without knowing what an general election is and why it's important? How did you even get to 35 without knowing?

Please tell me you're in the DWP at a JCP and so are far removed from policy?

It feels like there are elections every year because in many places there are but this is local elections. People will have voted a couple of weeks ago and depending on where they live will have voted for local councillors, mayors and/or Police and Crime Commissioner. The local elections are all about your local area - that could be parish, town, county level. These are the people making decisions about which roads to repair and which libraries to close.

The general election happens every 4-5 years and is usually the chance for our Prime Minister to change. Growing up I would say they happened pretty much like clockwork. Labour were last in power in 2010, at this general election the Tories did not have enough seats to take power by themselves and so they went into a coalition (shared power) with the Lib Dem’s, which is an unlikely pairing as they are both opposite ends of the political spectrum. Tories held most of those seats though and so were the main drivers in change. Another election was held in 2015 and there was a rise of the far right with UKIP gaining a lot of ground. To counter this, the Tories promised a referendum on whether the UK should leave the EU if they were elected in again. The were voted in this time and without needing a coalition. They kept their promise and offered a referendum. The leader of the Tories at the time was David Cameron and when the referendum result was delivered he decided that he was not the person to lead the country through this period.

We didn’t have an election but there was a change in PM. This was done through a leadership contest which was won by Theresa May. She called a snap general election in 2017, so only two years since the previous general election. The Tories won that election but the story party had little confidence in Theresa May and she had two votes of no confidence before finally stepping down and another leadership contest was started. This was won by Boris Johnson. He then called another general election in December 2019. The Tories won that general election.

Since that election Johnson has stepped down as PM, we had another leadership contest which was won by Liz Truss. She was PM for a very short time and we had another leadership contest which was won by Rishi Sunak. Sunak did not have to call a general election until January 2025 and everyone largely believed he would call an election in October/November of this year.

There are a few reasons it is a hot topic/interesting. 1) The polls are indicating that the Tories will lose this election and Labour will be in power. Many people feel that may address some of the failing civil infrastructure we have. Or even if not, most people feel despondent about the state of the country and think a change of leadership might be a breath of fresh air. 2) There is the argument that Rishi Sunak (or Liz Truss) were not our elected leaders. The members of the Conservative Party vote for the leader of the party so it’s not representative of the country. The argument to this is that unless the PM is in your consistency, you don’t actually vote for the leader of the country. You vote for your MP and that party is then in power. However, at least with the leadership clear at a general election you understand that your Conservative vote may contribute to Rishi Sunak being PM or your Labour vote May contribute to Kier Starmer being PM. 3) July is an unusual choice for a general election, so people are trying to work out what prompted that. 4) with 3 general elections and a referendum in 4 and a half years, it feels like this has been a very long time that the public have had no say in how the country is being run. Obviously this is within the timeframe they are allowed but a lot has happened since the previous general election - pandemic, war in Ukraine, cost of living and people feel there should have been a general election earlier to give the people a chance to have a say.

For the civil service and you, it means you will likely have a new minister for your department. This may be true even if the Conservatives win as the minister currently leading the dept May step down or not be elected again. This new minister may be more or less engaged than your current one. If they are more engaged, you should start to feel like your dept is making progress. If less engaged, you’ll feel you’re going backwards. If your dept is not on the depts that is a priority for the party in power in July, there may be redundancies in the department. However, civil service has a good redeployment scheme and they will try to find an alternate role for any people at risk in new departments.

Why would you need that knowledge to get in?

CS recruitment and promotion has, for donkeys years, been based on displaying competencies appropriate to the grade being recruited or promoted to. This version is old but I doubt the current iteration is massively different.

Questions at interview are along the lines of 'tell us how you have showed the ability to deliver at pace'. The candidate will be expected to show that with what are, or at least are meant to be, real world examples.

The days of theoretical questions like 'how would you use a computer in your office' or dealing with a older male staffer behaving inappropriately with younger females are long gone. And yes I had both those on my HEO board in 1985.